Around 61 per cent of estate agents said they expected the property market to begin recovering within a year, while 28 per cent thought it would take between one and two years before prices stabilised, according to high street bank Abbey.
But seven per cent of those questioned thought prices would continue to fall for at least three years, and three per cent thought the current downturn would last even longer.
All the major house price indexes are showing price falls, with Nationwide Building Society last week saying homes cost 6.3 per cent less in June than they did a year ago.
But homeowners are more optimistic about the outlook for property than estate agents, with people expecting prices to stop falling within seven months on average, and no homeowners expecting the current problems to extend beyond 12 months.
Eight out of 10 homeowners said they were delaying a decision on whether or not to move to see if prices fell further.
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Jay B, oldham (09/07/2008 at 09:28)
well i have no sympathy for them.
they've had it too good for too long now. the reason we're in this mess is because of them overinflating the prices in the first place.
i've been trying to get on the property ladder for years now. but have been reluctant because of all the rises. how can a house that was only worth say £99k four or five years ago be £250k+ now with nothing actually done to it?
my wage hasnt gone up in line with it.
with the current credit crunch and high fuel prices, hopefully people will now realise estate agents have been fleecing us for so long to get the maximum cut in their commission.
Black Sabbath (09/07/2008 at 10:02)
Black Flag (09/07/2008 at 10:10)
Because wages were rising and more importantly, banks increased the amounts they were prepared to lend, which put more money into the property market and pushed up prices.
Rising prices are not caused by estate agents. Agents are employed by sellers and sellers will always try to get the most they can for their house. The market sets the price, based on what the seller is prepared to accept and what the buyer is prepared to pay. Estate agents are just intermediaries.
Jay B, oldham (09/07/2008 at 11:46)
i know greed of people has helped too. the banks havent helped either buy lending more and more vast sums of money.
wages haven't really gone up though. for what increases we've seen. the cost of living has gone up too.
two estate agents near me have gone pop, and it was because they where the ones that always over inflated the prices. these where the culprits that drove these prices up. i have no sympathy for them at all.
irvtheswerv (09/07/2008 at 13:38)
Take any housing market in the world since WWII, and you'll find that once long prices rise above 3.5* the average household income, then they are overpriced. According to ONS average household income is £33,000, so that means the average houseprice should be in the region of £115,000. Any higher than that can only be sustained by interest rates lower than the long term average of 7-8%. But that is what mortgage rates are now, and they don't look like dropping due to inflationary pressures, so I guess there's some way to go before prices bottom out. The estate agents are (bless them) only trying to talk themselves up to avoid going bust, which you can't blame them for.
Black Flag (09/07/2008 at 14:33)
Not it isn't. Estate agents tell people what they can sell their house for, which is what a buyer is prepared to pay. An estate agent can't force somebody to buy a house if they aren't happy with the price.
It is a housing market and in a market, prices are set by agreement between buyers and sellers. All an estate agent does is give the seller an indication of what buyers are prepared to pay.
Jay B, oldham (09/07/2008 at 15:26)
i cannot believe that the papers and the tv are making them look like they're the victims.
they're the reason i cannot afford a house still.
Barry Thornton (10/07/2008 at 23:19)